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Crowheart Butte was shrouded in smoke Thursday afternoon as seen from the rest area near Bull Lake. Photo by Katie Roenigk

Blazes on West Coast causing hazy skies in Wind River Basin

Jul 18, 2014 - By Katie Roenigk, Staff Writer

The smoke wafting through Fremont County this week is coming from blazes burning more than 1,000 miles away.

"In Oregon and southern Washington there's a whole slew of fires," National Weather Service meteorologist Jeff Braun said Friday. "Then there's also a bunch of fires in Canada, from Alberta and Saskatchewan and points further north."

The local smoke is mostly from the West Coast, but Braun said the haze from Canada may be contributing as well.

"That was coming in mainly to northern parts of Wyoming just north of us, (but) a little could have combined in there too," Braun said. "Either way, the southern half of Wyoming is getting it from the Western states of Oregon and Washington, and Montana and northern Wyoming is getting it from Canada."

Pretty sunsets

Visibility could clear in the near future, but as of Friday, Braun said it was difficult to make out the Wind River Mountains from the NWS office in Riverton.

On a more positive note, he pointed out that the smoke "makes for pretty sunsets."

"If it gets even thicker -- like it does sometimes -- you get those nice photographic days even during the midday," he said. "It filters the sunlight in here and makes things more yellow than they normally would be at midday.